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Although some critics have dismissed Cheever as a writer of the "New Yorker school," a chronicler of suburbia, or a clever satirist, his impressive achievements in both the short story and the novel belie these claims and attest to his importance in American letters. Cheever, unlike many contemporary American writers, is neither stylistically flamboyant nor philosophically pessimistic. Although he has experimented with various narrative techniques, his art is essentially that of the storyteller, and while he clearly recognizes those aspects of modern life which might lead to pessimism, his comic vision remains basically optimistic. His characters all face a similar problem: how to live in a world which, in spite of its middle-class comforts and assurances, suddenly appears inhospitable, even dangerous. Many of his characters go down in defeat, usually by their own hand. Those who survive, in mind as well as body, discover the personal and social virtue of compromise.
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